1 Injured In Navy Helicopter Crash A Day After ‘Aviation Mishap’ Kills 5 Marines

A U.S. Navy helicopter crashed Thursday afternoon in the Imperial County desert north of Yuma, along the California-Arizona border. The news came about a day after a Marine aircraft crashed west in the same area, resulting in the death of all five Marines on board.

Talking about the Thursday crash, Commander Zachary Harrell, a spokesperson for the Naval Air Forces Command in San Diego, said the downed MH-60S Seahawk chopper assigned to Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 3 carried four crew members for a training mission in the desert area, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

“It was a crash, and everybody survived,” Harrell told the outlet. He added that one crew member sustained non-life-threatening injuries and was transported to a hospital. The helicopter is based at Naval Air Station North Island.

In a press release on the incident, the Navy said the MH-60S Seahawk “crashed near El Centro, California, while conducting a routine training flight from Naval Air Facility El Centro” at around 6 p.m. Thursday. El Centro is a county seat of Imperial County.

The Naval Air Facility El Centro first released an alert about the crash on its Facebook page, noting that rescue teams and firefighters were deployed to the scene.

No further details, including the cause of the crash, were released.

News of the Navy aircraft crash came about a day after the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) confirmed the deaths of all five members of the Marine crew onboard an MV-22B Osprey that crashed at around 12:25 p.m. Wednesday in a desert area near Glamis, California. Glamis is also located in rural Imperial County.

The MV-22B Osprey was assigned to the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW), 1st Lt. Duane Kampa, a spokesman for the 3rd MAW, was cited as saying by KNSD. The crew members were based at Marine Corps Air Station Camp Pendleton under Marine Aircraft Group 39.

Officials said an investigation is underway as recovery efforts of items from the wreckage at the scene ensue.

In a statement, the 3rd MAW said it is “committed to providing support to the families, friends, and fellow service members of the fallen Marines” in what it referred to as an “aviation mishap.”

In an earlier post, the 3rd MAW clarified “there was no nuclear material on board the aircraft” after some social media posts and early radio calls from emergency responders on-scene suggested otherwise.